The Cities That Built the Bible

by Dr. Robert Cargill

  GREEK PHILOSOPHY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

  The Hebrew Bible isn’t the only part of the Bible that experienced Greek influence. Because the sect of Jews that believed Jesus of Nazareth to be the promised Messiah (later called “Christians”) was a thoroughly hellenized Jewish movement, we should not be surprised that the New Testament in several places exhibits examples of Greek thought.

  Greek deities and otherworldly places make several appearances in the New Testament. “Gehenna”10 became the term used most often in the New Testament for the fiery underworld abode that came to be known as “hell,”11 but two other Greek words are used to reference this place of unquenchable fire as well. The first is Hades (Gk.ᾅδης), the Greek god of the underworld, whose name became synonymous with the abode of the dead.12 The second is Tartarus (Gk. Τάρταρος; 2 Pet. 2:4), the deep dungeon of torment beneath Hades reserved for the vilest of criminals, where they are punished for eternity. Famous residents of Tartarus in Greek mythology include Tantalus, who sacrificed his son, Pelops, and served him at a banquet to the gods, who punished him by standing him in a pool (whose water he could never drink) beneath an abundant fruit tree (whose fruit he could never eat), giving us the word “tantalize”; and Sisyphus, who tricked Death into chaining himself in Tartarus, for which he was punished by being eternally forced to roll a boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll back down and have to begin again. It is the idea of Tartarus that became the popular image of hell as a place of eternal punishment in the Christian tradition.

  But Greek influence on Christianity wasn’t limited to the concept of hell. The idea of an independent soul (ψυχή, psyche) that exists apart from the body is a Greek contribution to very late Jewish and then Christian theology. Prior to the hellenization of Judaism, the Hebrew word nefesh () simply designated something that was alive; that is, in the early Hebrew Bible, nefesh meant simply “life” or “living,” and it was lost when living beings died.13 Throughout the Hebrew Bible, when a person died, he or she was said to go to a place called she’ol (Heb. ), which is where all living beings went when they died.14 There is no concept of life after death in the Hebrew Bible until we begin to see it appear in books that were written at a very late date (like Daniel), and even then the life after death described there involved resurrection from the dead, not the transcendence of an immortal soul.15 It was only much later, following a period of sustained, invasive hellenization, that the word nefesh would come to be used as equivalent to the Greek idea of the soul,16 something that would transcend your body and live beyond your physical life—a concept that was then adopted by early Christianity.

  Greek influence on the New Testament is not limited to a few borrowed words and concepts. Rather, the New Testament preserves numerous quotes from many famous Greek writers (usually without attribution). On many occasions in the New Testament, Paul’s letters employ the writings of Greek authors as a rhetorical device to convince Greek listeners that the gospel Paul was preaching was similar to the great teachings of those legendary Greek philosophers. Thus, much of what Paul wrote was either inspired by classical philosophers or taken directly from their writings. The New Testament may have been written by “inspired men,” but precisely where that inspiration may have come from is debated by scholars.

  Of course, Paul says that he dislikes philosophy, preferring the “folly” of the Christian message (see 1 Cor. 1:18). This stands in opposition to many Jewish attempts to make the Jewish faith as palatable to Romans as possible by recasting Jewish religion and literature as Hellenistic philosophy. Both Philo of Alexandria (25 BCE–50 CE) and Flavius Josephus (37–100 CE) did this in their writings. Paul chastises Greek “wisdom” in 1 Corinthians 1:18–31, and Colossians 2:8 offers a full-blown warning against philosophy: “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ.”

  However much Paul may rail against the content of Greek philosophy, especially when it is at odds with his gospel, he nonetheless references the pagan Greek philosophers and utilizes classical forms of rhetoric in his preaching. This may come as a shock to some readers, but a quick look at a few obvious examples will demonstrate Paul’s use of Greek philosophy.

  For instance, Paul states in 1 Corinthians 15:33: “Do not be deceived: ‘Bad company ruins good morals.’” Many scholars attribute this quote to the dramatist Menander (342–290 BCE), from his comedy Thaïs, which he, in turn, likely quoted from the Greek tragedian Euripides (480–406 BCE).17 The church historian Socrates of Constantinople (380–439 CE) attributes the quote to Euripides in his Ecclesiastical History: “Again this sentence, ‘Evil communications corrupt good manners,’ is a sufficient proof that he was conversant with the tragedies of Euripides” (3.16). Thus, Paul is quoting an existing Greek saying without actually crediting the author.18

  In Titus 1:12, we read an interesting passage attributed to Paul (likely an author claiming to be Paul) written to Titus, who oversees a church in Crete, regarding some rabble-rousers who are essentially not teaching what Paul taught. In the midst of the author’s instruction to censor these false teachers, he states, “It was one of them, their very own prophet, who said, ‘Cretans are always liars, vicious brutes, lazy gluttons.’” Here the author acknowledges that he is quoting an unnamed “prophet” who is believed to be Epimenides of Knossos according to Socrates of Constantinople.19 A Greek poet and scholar at the Library of Alexandria, Callimachus of Cyrene (310 or 305–240 BCE), also appears to cite the line in his Hymn to Zeus:

  O Zeus, some say that thou wert born on the hills of Ida; others, O Zeus, say in Arcadia; did these or those, O Father, lie? “Cretans are ever liars.” Yea, a tomb, O Lord, for thee the Cretans builded; but thou didst not die, for thou art for ever.20

  The apostle Paul also appears to have alluded to (if not quoted outright) Plato on at least a couple of occasions. Paul writes in Philippians 1:21, “For to me, living is Christ and dying is gain.” Plato said almost identically, “Now if death is like this, I say to die is gain.”21 On another occasion, Paul writes, “See that none of you repays evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to all” (1 Thess. 5:15). Plato writes something similar at least four hundred years earlier when he recounts Socrates’s statement: “Then we ought neither to requite wrong with wrong nor to do evil to anyone.”22 In 1 Corinthians 9:24, Paul writes, “Do you not know that in a race the runners all compete, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win it.” He appears yet again to be channeling Plato’s most famous work, the Republic, in which Plato writes, “But the true runners when they have come to the goal receive the prizes and bear away the crown.”23

  Paul may also have been familiar with the teachings of Aristotle. In Galatians 5:23, Paul utters the line, “There is no law against such things.” He dictates a similar line in Romans 2:14, when he says, “When Gentiles, who do not possess the law, do instinctively what the law requires, these, though not having the law, are a law to themselves.” Both lines seem to echo the words of Aristotle, who four hundred years earlier wrote in Politics, “but there can be no law dealing with such men as those described, for they are themselves a law.”24 Again, we see that Paul uses the rhetoric and popular lines, in this case, of Aristotle to make his argument.

  Perhaps one of my favorite instances of Paul’s incorporation of the work of a classical Greek author is in Acts 26:14–15. Here Paul recounts his conversion experience on the road to Damascus as part of his trial before Herod Agrippa II and states that he heard Jesus speak to him from the heavens:

  When we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It hurts you to kick against the goads.” I asked, “Who are you, Lord?” The Lord answered, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.”

  In the expression “kick against the goads” (KJV: “kick against the prick
s”),25 “goads” are spurs used to prod horses and other animals to move along. “Kicking against the goads” is what an animal does when it’s being stubborn; hence Jesus’s comment to the stubborn Paul. What is interesting is that this expression actually comes from the play Agamemnon by the Greek tragedian Aeschylus (525–456 BCE). In the play, the antagonist, Aegisthus, who was sleeping with Agamemnon’s wife, Clytemnestra, says the following, “Kick not against the pricks, lest thou strike to thy hurt.”26

  So we have evidence either that Jesus loved Greek tragedies and recited Hebrew translations of his favorite lines from heaven or that Paul may have been attempting to impress the Roman procurator at the time, Porcius Festus, who oversaw Paul’s trial (Acts 25:24), by attributing to Jesus an expression from a popular Greek play (which was left out of the account of the same conversion experience in Acts 9:3–9) or to impress King Herod Agrippa II by claiming Jesus uttered the line in Hebrew.27 Regardless, the fact that Jesus is said to utter a line from a Greek tragedy should not be lost to careful readers.

  PAUL IN ATHENS

  But Paul’s most obvious incorporation of Greek philosophy and classical writings comes from his famous “Areopagus Sermon” in Athens, recorded in Acts 17:16–34. The book of Acts suggests that the beginnings of Christianity reached Athens via the apostle Paul, who the Bible says visited the city on his second missionary trip.

  Paul’s famous sermon on the Areopagus in Athens has long been cited as an example of Paul’s (or the author of Acts’s) skilled rhetoric. Rather than lashing out at the Athenians for worshipping gods other than YHWH, as the Hebrew prophets of old had done against idolators, Paul is said to have praised the Athenians’ religiosity in order to hold their attention as he introduced his gospel to them.

  The speech begins in Acts 17:16–18:

  While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was deeply distressed to see that the city was full of idols. So he argued in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and also in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. Also some Epicurean and Stoic philosophers debated with him. Some said, “What does this babbler want to say?”

  The author of Acts sets Paul on equal footing with the Epicureans and Stoics and then uses the well-attested culture of debate at the Areopagus (17:19) as the setting for Paul’s testimony to the Jewish God and Christ’s role in this tradition. As Roslyn and I gazed down upon the Areopagus from atop the Acropolis, we imagined Paul preaching below.

  Acts 17:22–23 follows:

  Then Paul stood in front of the Areopagus and said, “Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way. For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship, I found among them an altar with the inscription, ‘To an unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.”

  Note how Paul cleverly uses the presence of the many architectural monuments to various deities atop the Athenian Acropolis looming in the background to invite those listening to hear about a god they did not yet know about.

  Paul continues by giving a summary of the Jewish faith, arguing first that “the God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands” (17:24). Paul’s phrase “does not live in shrines made by human hands” may actually be a reference to the work On Benefits by the Roman Stoic philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca “the Younger” (4 BCE–65 CE), who lived during the time of Jesus and whom the church father Tertullian (155–240 CE) called “our Seneca.”28 Seneca wrote, “The whole world is the temple of the gods,”29 and is quoted by Lactantius (250–325 CE) as having said, “Temples are not to be built to God of stones piled on high. He must be consecrated in the heart of every man,”30 echoing the same sentiment.

  Paul’s statement in Acts 17:25, “Nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things,” sounds a lot like another of Seneca’s statements from his Moral Letters to Lucilius: “For God seeks no servants. Of course not; he himself services mankind, everywhere and to all he is at hand to help.”31

  Seneca also stated in the same letter, “We are the parts of one great body. Nature produced us related to one another, since she created us from the same source and to the same end.”32 Paul seems to have had this in mind when he argues in 17:26, “From one ancestor he made all nations to inhabit the whole earth,” perhaps adapting Seneca’s quote to fit with his own belief in a historical Adam.

  Paul then appears to reference Seneca’s Moral Letters once again when he states in 17:28, “In him we live and move and have our being.” This is quite similar to Seneca’s claims that “God is at hand everywhere and to all men. . . . God is near you; he is with you; he is within you”33 and that “a holy spirit indwells within us,”34 demonstrating that Paul was well versed in Seneca’s writings.

  A view of the Acropolis of Athens from the Areopagus. Note that several of the monuments to various Greek deities (under restoration) are easily visible from the Areopagus.

  A view of the Areopagus of Athens mentioned in Acts 17 as seen from atop the Acropolis, with the modern city of Athens in the background.

  Paul follows this by acknowledging in Acts 17:28 that he, in fact, is referencing Greek authors: “Even as some of your own poets have said, ‘For we too are his offspring.’” This is a direct (but unattributed) reference to the Greek poet Aratus of Soli (315 or 310–240 BCE), who in his Phaenomena (“Appearances”) wrote of Zeus: “We all have need of Zeus always! For we are also his offspring; and in his kindness to men he gives favorable signs and awakens the people to work, reminding them of livelihood.”35 Again, Paul appears to be lifting out of context individual phrases from well-known Greek works in a rhetorical attempt to make the Hebrew God appear more acceptable to Greek Hellenistic philosophers. Paul argues that the Greeks are correct in arguing that we are all the offspring of the same deity, but this deity is YHWH, not Zeus.

  Finally, in Acts 17:29, Paul returns to channeling Seneca’s Moral Letters when he says, “Since we are God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the deity is like gold, or silver, or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of mortals.” This again echoes the writings of Seneca: “And fashion yourself worthy of God.36 This fashioning will not be done in gold or silver; an image that is to be in the likeness of God cannot be fashioned of such materials.”37

  Thus, we can conclude that at just about every point in Paul’s classic Areopagus speech, he is making allusions and direct references to the works of classical Greek authors, which would have served the rhetorical purpose of making his gospel of Jesus sound more like traditional Hellenistic philosophy, with the hope that it would sound familiar to the men on the Areopagus and therefore be more convincing to them. It is also further evidence that Greek thought and literature directly impacted the words of the apostle Paul, who cited and referenced them specifically. This means that the words of the Greek philosophers and writers directly contributed to the composition of the Bible itself, as many sentences that form the “Word of God” are actually famous lines from classical Greek authors.

  THE LEGACY OF ATHENS

  Athens is far more important to the Bible than the few brief mentions within its pages. Athens was the center of the very Greek philosophy, religious ideas, language, and culture that were conveyed to the Holy Land following Alexander the Great’s conquests. This Greek culture would later integrate with and redefine Second Temple Judaism, transforming the Jewish and later Christian beliefs that would go on to shape the Western world. Paul’s recasting of Judaism and the Christian message in the language of Hellenistic and Roman philosophy allowed it to be welcomed beyond the borders of Judea. In fact, it can be said that without Athens and hellenization, Judaism and Christianity would have never left Roman Palestine.

  Because Greek philosophy and religious thought—particularly views of an independent soul and the afterlife—so
heavily influenced Judaism during the Hellenistic period, Judaism and Christianity came to be concerned with right living in this world as the means of achieving eternal life in the next. Thus, it can be said that Athens literally contributed the “soul” to both Judaism and Christianity.

  CHAPTER 7

  Alexandria

  In Chapter 1 we discussed Egypt’s most famous export (other than Pyramid souvenirs and mummy movies), namely, papyrus, the forerunner to modern paper, which was originally made from the pith of the papyrus plants found along the banks of the Nile. The plant fibers were layered and pressed into flexible, smooth sheets that could be sewn together to form a scroll and written upon.1

  Most people are familiar with the modern capital city of Egypt, Cairo. They know about the famed Pyramids of Giza and the Sphinx and recall vividly when the Raiders of the Lost Ark character Sallah belted out the line, “Cairo, city of the living!” in his distinctive voice. But many may not realize that the center of the Egyptian world in the first millennium CE was not in Cairo, but a Mediterranean coastal city that is never mentioned in the Hebrew Bible and only referenced in passing in the New Testament; this is the city of Alexandria.2